Production of l-theanine by in the absence of supplemental ethylamine

l-Theanine is a nonproteinogenic amino acid present almost exclusively in tea plants and is beneficial for human health. For industrial production, l-theanine is enzymatically or chemically synthesized from glutamine/glutamate (or a glutamine/glutamate derivative) and ethylamine. Ethylamine is extremely flammable and toxic, which complicates and increases the cost of operational procedures. To solve these problems, we developed an artificial biosynthetic pathway to produce l-theanine in the absence of supplemental ethylamine. For this purpose, we identified and selected the novel transaminase AAN70747 from KT2440, which catalyzes the transamination of acetaldehyde to produce ethylamine, as well as γ-glutamylmethylamide synthetase AAY37316 from pv. syringae B728a, which catalyzes the condensation of l-glutamate and ethylamine to produce l-theanine. Expressing these genes in W3110S3GK and enhancing the production capacity of acetaldehyde and l-alanine achieved successful production of l-theanine without ethylamine supplementation. Furthermore, the deletion of , which encodes γ-glutamyltranspeptidase (EC 2.3.2.2), achieved large-scale production of l-theanine by attenuating its decomposition. We show that an alanine decarboxylase-utilizing pathway represents a promising route for the fermentative production of l-theanine. To our knowledge, this is the first report of efficient methods to produce l-theanine in the absence of supplemental ethylamine.l-Theanine is widely used in food additives and dietary supplements. Industrial production of l-theanine uses the toxic and highly flammable precursor ethylamine, raising production costs. Here we used to engineer two biosynthetic pathways that produce l-theanine from glucose and ammonia in the absence of supplemental ethylamine. This study establishes a foundation for safely and economically producing l-theanine.